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Denmark ends adoptions from abroad as government sanctions bureau

Denmark’s only international adoption bureau Danish International Adoption (DIA) is to close, effectively ending adoption from abroad to the Nordic country.

Published: 16 January 2024 17:10 CET
Denmark ends adoptions from abroad as government sanctions bureau
Illustration photo. Photo by Omar Lopez on Unsplash

DIA’s board made the decision to cease operations after being hit by a string of sanctions by the public regulator Ankestyrelsen and the Ministry of Social Affairs, it said in a press statement.

Because DIA is the only Danish mediation organisation for international adoptions, Danish nationals or residents who want to adopt a child from abroad must do so through DIA.

The bureau is an independent NGO accredited by the Ministry of Social Affairs and regulated through a series of accreditation clauses between DIA and Ankestyrelsen.

Its decision to cease operations will effectively end international adoption to Denmark.

“This was a heavy decision to take for DIA’s board, but we see no alternative,” vice-chair of the board at DIA, Anne Friis, said in the statement.

“International adoption can no longer be operated by an NGO like us under the current conditions in Denmark,” she said.

The Social ministry and Ankestyrelsen are both responsible for oversight of DIA.

Ankestyrelsen last month suspended DIA’s operations in South Africa, the country where the largest share of its activities are based, while the ministry on Monday decided to suspend DIA’s five remaining national arrangements with Taiwan, the Philippines, India, Thailand and Czechia.

The Minister of Social Affairs and Housing, Pernille Rosenkrantz-Theil, told broadcaster TV2 that DIA had broken employment regulations.

According to TV2’s reports, Ankestyrelsen ordered DIA to explain why one of its employees was also listed as an employee with South African partner Impilo. It also said two “undocumented payments” had been made to the employee in question.

Broadcaster DR has previously reported irregularities in adoptions from Madagascar mediated by DIA.

Some 36 applicants for adoption are currently on the bureau’s waiting list, divided between its various partner countries.

According to DIA, around 400-500 children were adopted to Denmark from abroad from the 1970s until 2010, but the number has since declined.

The number of partner countries and adoptions is now too low to make ongoing operations viable, DIA board member Mikael Baden said to news wire Ritzau.

“We are in a place where the sustainability of our structure is no longer viable , and it’s no longer viable to operate within the political framework,” he said.

DIA’s involvement in international adoptions is regulated by an accreditation system which must be renewed by Ankestyrelsen annually.

The regulator must also approve all country partnerships and all individual adoptions.

“As part of the accreditation agreement, there’s a contingency plan for any instance in which DIA’s work should cease,” the bureau said in its statement.

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FAMILY

Birth rate among immigrants in Denmark falls below Danes, new data reveals

Women who have moved to Denmark from countries considered ‘non-Western’ are now having fewer children than Danes, according to new data.

Published: 12 April 2024 10:50 CEST
Birth rate among immigrants in Denmark falls below Danes, new data reveals

Figures from national agency Statistics Denmark, first reported by science journal Videnskab.dk, show that women in the statistical group “non-Western immigrants” have 1.4 children on average, while women with Danish heritage have 1.6 children on average.

The numbers are from 2023 and apply to the total number of children women have throughout their life.

The new data represents a reversal of a trend in recent years in which birth rates were lower for Danes, and were described as “surprising” by Professor Christian Albrekt Larsen of Aalborg University’s Sociology department.

“Traditionally, non-Western immigrants have pulled the birth rate in Denmark upwards. Now they have around the same fertility rate as Danish women,” Larsen told Videnskab.

Statistics from 1993 show that, 30 years ago, non-Western women in Denmark had an average of 3.4 children. Their birth rate has therefore halved over the course of three decades.

For statistical purposes, Statistics Denmark considers a person to be Danish if she or he has at least one parent who is a Danish citizen and was born in Denmark.

The trend is a sign that women of immigrant background have adapted culturally to Denmark’s welfare state according to Peter Fallesen, a research professor with the Rockwool Foundation who specialises in children and fertility.

“When you move to another country there is a cultural adaptation to the new country. In Denmark this is often about becoming less dependent on children, both in regard to labour and when you get older and need help,” Fallesen told Videnskab.

The research professor also noted that harder financial circumstances related to inflation and certain political decisions can affect the desire and options available to immigrant women who have children.

Falling birth rates have caused concern in a number of countries, including Denmark, where the average fertility rate in 2022 and 2023 was 1.5. A birth rate of 2.1 children per woman is considered to be necessary for a society to sustain itself.

Meanwhile, all EU countries along with Andorra, Australia, Canada, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Monaco, New Zealand, Norway, San Marino, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, the United States and the Vatican are considered ‘Western’.

Everywhere else – all of Latin America, Africa and Asia, and some eastern European countries including Ukraine – is ‘non-Western’.

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